Prepared by Jay O'Brien from original communication files

Were you pleased with the Community Meeting yesterday? I wasn't.

I was unhappy that Supervisor Dickinson limited participants to only one subject during his open meeting.

I had several items over and above the Elkhorn Ditch that I would have brought up, given the opportunity. Most were minor, but it would have been nice to get official commitments. Others commented to me that they also had additional subjects but were only recognized for one subject.

Items I was not given the opportunity to bring up:
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DITCH MOWING. An apparent lack of coordination between Solid Waste and the folks who mow the road shoulders; the area between the pavement and our ditches. I just couldn't understand why Transportation was mowing during the Neighborhood Clean Up (NCU) schedule. It really seems stupid to me. I talked to Solid Waste; they assured me that the mowing folks have the NCU schedule and are supposed to understand what it means. As I couldn't bring it up during the open meeting, I talked to Paul Gunkel from Transportation. He explained that Transportation used to do the mowing, but that isn't their job any more. It has been moved to another department, the one (Water Quality, I think) who gives the mowers most of their work orders. He said that he would try to get my complaint to the right person. With Dickinson's direction, this would happen, and it would be fixed. But with only Gunkel pushing it, I'm afraid that we'll see the same thing next year. STUPID. The mower has to be lifted to pass a trash pile; the weeds under and beyond the trash don't get mowed.

WEB PAGE. I was going to ask Roger why his web page has Elverta misspelled. His new spelling is "Eleverta". I wanted to ask him when he had last viewed his web page, but I didn't get a chance. See http://www.co.sacramento.ca.us/dist_1.html for the new spelling. It's been that way for many months.

NEIGHBORHOOD CLEANUP. I planned to compliment Roger for the excellent job done this year by the Solid Waste people doing the NCU. I planned to ask him about the police tape put around the illegal piles, with the signs citing the code sections. I planned to comment that I understood that the residue left this year by the NCU teams was due to short crews due to sickness and I planned to get his commitment that, especially with the rate increase, that residents wouldn't be obliged to pick up after the NCU crews next year; that more personnel would be funded.

OTHER THOUGHTS:
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Thanks to Don Flesch for reminding Dickinson that there were other candidates for office besides the person Dickinson is supporting for the Grant School Board.

Thanks to Pollie Parker for reminding Dickinson that he is supposed to be OUR advocate in dealing with the proposed power plant, and revisiting the strange change in AR density in the north part of the Elverta Specific Plan.

Thanks to Debbie Bryne for telling Dickinson that a farmer wouldn't have disced the AR area in the north part of the Elverta Specific Plan area as it was done, wiping out the vernal pools.

Thanks to Mel Griffin for exposing "Angelo" as the land owner who eliminated the vernal pools.

Thanks to Bob Ames for telling Dickinson that he wasn't giving the water district enough time to move pipes before raising Dry Creek Road.

Supervisor Dickinson made some brave timing statements about when the exact planned location of the Elkhorn Ditch (Upper Northwest Interceptor) was known, and he claimed that the information wasn't available when utility lines were moved to accommodate the Elkhorn widening project. He said, after asking for correction from staff (who was silent), "at the time the local utilities were located on this extension of Elkhorn, for example the water district line, that conflict with the interceptor couldn't be precisely calculated because we didn't know precisely where the interceptor would go."  I disagree with Supervisor Dickinson. They did know. My records show that the engineering plans, prepared for the Sacramento Regional County Sanitation District (SRCSD) by Corrolo Engineers which show the exact location of the interceptor were dated "April 1999". The Water District drawings, showing the exact location of the moved water pipes, were submitted to the County in early May 1999. The County's approving signature, by Cheryl Creson, County Engineering Department Director, was affixed to the water district's plans on June 14, 1999. This, coupled with the SRCSD's timely EIR comment on the Elkhorn widening, in the EIR approved by the Board of Supervisors on May 12, 1998, stressing the need for close coordination, shows a distressing lack of communication within the County hierarchy.

Did everyone catch Dickinson's response to me that he represents the City residents who have petitioned to close Sorento Road at East Levee Road? Dickinson assures us that he wouldn't support the closure of East Levee Road without a suitable alternative route. Yet he supports this closure, even before the extension of National to Elkhorn and before the completion of the Ueda Parkway. Does he really think that using the extension of Truxel (Natomas Blvd.) to Elkhorn will be as good for us in going to places on North Market Blvd.? He is routing us through the City to get from one unincorporated County area to another. Yes, he certainly represents the people who want to close Sorento Road. No question. That's what they want, and they don't want our "through traffic." Roger will continue to get the votes of his constituents in the City of Sacramento by seeing to their wishes.

How about an opposing view? From someone that thought the meeting was perfect?

The coffee was great. Nice touch.

Jay

Note that he responded to every item in my message EXCEPT my paragraph about the Elkhorn Ditch, which he avoided completely.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: RE: Community Meeting yesterday
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 18:21:57 -0700
From: "Dickinson, Roger" <rogerd@sac.ca.gov>
To: 'Jay O'Brien' <jayobrien@att.net>,
CC: "Dickinson, Roger" <rogerd@sac.ca.gov>

Jay:

I'm sorry that you didn't like the format I used for the community meeting. I thought that a different approach than the traditional community meeting might be more useful for people who had a specific concern or question and who didn't want to wait all night to get to ask the person who could best respond.  There was no limiting of people to one subject, but I did try to give as many different people as possible the chance to speak.  You may not have noticed, but the group discussion went on for over an hour, and I stayed until the last person who wanted to talk to me or the staff had done so.

As to the specific items you raised in your email:

1)  I will inquire into the mowing in order to try to prevent future conflicts between it and trash collection.  By the way, you shouldn't sell Paul Gunkel short on what he can accomplish.

2)  If the spelling of Elverta is wrong on the web page, we will correct it.

3)  Solid Waste always tries to have sufficient crews to pick up everything put out for the NCU.  However, circumstances sometimes dictate that choices have to be made to accomplish the most for the most people.  I will stress to Solid Waste that planning needs to account for contingencies of personnel shortages.

While I don't need to respond to every other observation you included, I would add these additional comments:

1)  Regarding the potential power plant site, as I said, the County staff and I will review the options available to the County and will be directly involved as any plans proceed--just as my staff has closely followed the proceedings affecting the site since I took office.

2)  The ag-res area in the north part of the Elverta Specific Plan will be the subject of further public discussion regarding any plans which may be proposed.  All the issues, including preservation of ag-res for the area, and views of those who are interested will be thoroughly considered.

3)  The County planning and environmental staff are reviewing whether any inappropriate activity in grading land has occurred in the north part of the Elverta Specific Plan area.

4)  The raising of Dry Creek Rd. in the vicinity of the Bell Aqua apartments has been a project included in the Transportation Improvement Program for the County for several years and has been publicly discussed on a number of occasions.  As with all road projects, coordination with affected service providers will occur in a timely fashion.

5)  Regarding the closure of East Levee Rd. between Elkhorn and Sorrento, I noted that I also represent the residents of the Valley View Acres neighborhood as well as Rio Linda and Elverta.  I didn't say that I gave them any preference over those who live in Rio Linda and Elverta.  At the present, those in the County go through the City of Sacramento to get to the County area in the North Market vicinity.  That fact doesn't change if Truxel (Natomas) Blvd. is used instead of Sorrento.  East Levee will close as part of the establishment of the Ueda Parkway.  The only issue is when. If people in one neighborhood can have a safer, more enjoyable atomsphere with little inconvenience to others outside the neighborhood, I would hope there wouldn't be serious objection.

As always, I appreciate the concern and caring of those in Rio Linda and Elverta for their community.

ROGER DICKINSON
Supervisor, First District
Sacramento County

I avoided comment about his omission of the Elkhorn Ditch issue as it was so refreshing to actually receive a timely and detailed response to email sent to him, even if only a copy of something sent to the Rio Linda Elverta mailing list. Perhaps he responded beacuse my message to him was actually a copy of something I sent to the mailing list community? It's not important; a timely response was received.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [RL] RE: Community Meeting yesterday
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2000 20:03:33 -0700
From: Jay O'Brien <jayobrien@att.net>
Reply-To: riolinda@vrx.net
To: Roger Dickinson <rogerd@bos.co.sacramento.ca.us>
CC: Rio Linda Elverta Mailing List <riolinda@vrx.net>

Roger,

Thank you very much for the prompt and detailed response to the copy of my post to our community mailing list. It is really appreciated. By way of a copy of this email, the mailing list subscribers will also have the benefit of your responses.

Our local mailing list played some part in getting people out to your meeting.  Subscriptions are limited to members of the community, and it is an excellent venue for us to communicate with each other in near-real time.

And about Paul Gunkel; no way did I intend to sell him short. I was only attempting to point out that he would swing a bigger club if he could say "Supervisor Dickinson told his constituents that... , rather than "I heard from one resident of Rio Linda that..."  I think your name carries a lot more weight with County staff than does mine!

Jay
 

PS: To Rio Linda Elverta mailing list subscribers: If you should respond to this email and wish a copy to go to Roger, be sure to include him to receive a CC when you send your reply, as he will not receive a copy directly from our mailing list server.